Gadgeteers rejoice. HTC has released the first Windows Mobile 6.5 device thru Verizon Wireless, the HTC Imagio. The Imagio to some looks like a US version of the Touch HD, which was not released in the states. Time and time again we are left out of what people on the other side of the world are able to purchase and frequently wait for an announcement from a manufacturer to just shut us down. That looks to feel like those announcements are almost over. Since the bid for the 700 MHz spectrum has taken place, carriers are now more open to carry these handsets that are being released in other countries. Look at T-Mobile, in March they’re getting ready to launch the much anticipated, nerds dream phone, Windows Mobile Phone HTC Touch HD2. Verizon’s take in this is pretty simple, they didn’t get to launch the HD2, but they’re now trying to win over customers by getting more fashionably pretty handsets that get the job done; and make no mistake, while the Imagio screams buy me with that speaker grill/bezzel that makes it look oh so pretty, its as professional than any other PDA the rest of the carriers offer. Will the Imagio shine in places where other Windows Phones don’t? Find out after the jump for more information.

Hardware
What you see is what you get. The Imagio is one of the most beautiful Windows Phone devices made to date. The grill surrounding the front casing of the phone adds a little more than glamor into the picture. It comes with a 3.6-inch WVGA resistive touchscreen, Wi-Fi, GPS, a 5MP camera, 3.5mm headphone jack, microSD storage expansion (unfortunately it doesn’t include a card) and proximity sensor. It’s also the first smartphone with V-CAST Mobile TV, which is a Flo-TV based live streaming TV service that looks and feels a bit like digital cable, but made for a phone. It also has a valuable kickstand for picture and video viewing pleasure. When using the phone out in public, people thought I was using an iPhone 3GS because of its slick rounding edges and quarter glossy battery cover. From far it does look like an iPhone but its not. The build of the phone is very solid and feels very comfortable in your hands. The Imagio’s design features are very minimalistic. The volume keys are on the right, as well as the camera button, a row of buttons rests just beneath the screen, and the miniUSB charging port and 3.5mm jack are at the bottom end of the phone. Having the volume keys on the right side is different from most HTC phones, but sometimes change is good. When you use the kickstand to watch videos, having the volume keys on the right side makes them accessible due to the horizontal screen orientation. The button row contains your Answer, Multimedia, Start, Back, and End buttons. The end button doubles as a power on/off button.

Under the Hood

The Imagio features a Qualcomm 7600 series, 528MHz processor along with 288MB of RAM for all of your power user needs. The processor is pretty much the same that has been in the last few previous HTC devices, but with the bump in RAM at 288MB, it has a nice amount of extra speed to it so it doesn’t slow down as much as prior models did. With that being said, opening programs and switching between each of them is a breeze. There was little to no lag at all while having 10+ programs opened at the same time so that goes to show how Microsoft can stick it to Apple in one way. Under the back cover is the removable battery that is 1500mAh battery that should last you a whole day without charging it in the middle with moderate usage. I got through almost two whole days with emails, texting, web browsing and phone calls. Pretty good to know that I can rely on this if I need something to get me through a whole day or two. Underneath the battery you’ll find the sim card slot for international capabilities as well as the microSD slot and reset button. Usually the reset button on HTC devices is on the bottom, I wonder why they decided to place this one under the back cover. The Imagio is also equiped with bluetooth and Wi-Fi. The odd thing about the Wi-Fi is that you can turn it on/off in the settings window of WM 6.5 but in the TouchFLO Communications Manager, it is set to automatically turn on.

Media Device or Smartphone?

Windows Mobile isn’t usually known for their screen resolutions in all of their handsets (Touch HD & HD2 are the exceptions) or for music quality. Now replacing your iPod Touch or other personal PMP player is taking it to the extreme, but watching videos and listening to music on the Imagio is quite a pleasure. The sound of music is pretty much on par with an iPod and while video quality isn’t the best on this screen, a simple conversion using some type of program makes the viewing on this screen a delight to look at. The usual video codecs are on site such as .wmv, H.263, H.264. I also installed a DivX player and had no problem viewing a .divx and .xvid movie file. With that being said, I’m fondled on how come HTC didn’t implement their very own media player like they did with the Hero.

Call Quality
The call quality on the Imagio is great. Callers said I sounded loud and clear without any distortion. I had service pretty much everywhere I went and didn’t suffer from any dropped calls. Even in places where my Storm2 didn’t receive any bars the Imagio had one or two bars of 1X just so a call can come through. While listening to who I was speaking with, I noticed there was a slight hissing sound like their was with the LG Dare. Now I’m not sure if that was just my device doing that or if its an issue altogether, I’ll update the info on that when I find out more details. The speakerphone sounded loud and clear, even on its highest level. There was no distortion and the callers didn’t sound choppy when speaking. It would have been nice for HTC to implement the speaker button on the back of the Imagio just like on the TP2, but you can’t get everything right?

Windows Marketplace

I know what you’re thinking, “Not another marketplace”. Truth is, yes its another one. Since Apple has come out with theirs, it is almost in everyone’s utmost passion to develop a marketplace to have customers purchase software and games to stay interested with either their devices or the platform they are currently using. The Windows Marketplace is pretty new to the game and developers are creating applications for the platform. Now with that being said, applications should be a cinch to create for this platform since it has been out for almost a decade, but that doesn’t seem to be the case here. Developers are pretty much focused on the iPhone about 75% of the time and the closest app store is the Android one. How many apps are there available in the App Store now, somewhat close to 150,000? That is completely massive. Windows has some catching up to do. Besides that, the Marketplace is actually quite nice to look at though. When you enter the Marketplace, you have a search bar placed at the top as well as featured applications available for download. Directly under that you have a few categories to make finding your application a breeze. It’s broken down as follows: Showcase, Most Popular, What’s New, Categories and My Applications. The Showcase section is for the premium applications available for purchase. Most Popular, well, speaks for itself as well as What’s New, Categories and My Applications. Categories is broken down by categories (don’t need rocket science to figure that out ehh) such as business center, games, entertainment, and lifestyle. I like the overall style of the Marketplace, it’s nicely developed and categorized. Hopefully in the near future they have a bigger selection in applications, it’s still new so only time will tell.

Email/Messaging

The HTC Imagio supports SMS, MMS and email. SMS and MMS share an inbox and a message editor and thanks to TouchFLO, you can enjoy scrolling in the inboxes and through longer messages. The Message tab offers a great interface for managing messages. With the nice interface and touch-optimization it’s highly unlikely you will ever switch back to the standard Windows SMS inbox. The email inbox is also available as a homescreen tab with an eye-catching view. The email editor will hold no surprises for experienced WinMo users as it has not changed at all. Setting up your email is easy as it is on most of the latest mid or high range phones. You type your email and password and all the other steps are configured automatically. HTC has equipped the device with a set of home-grown thumbable virtual keyboards. It’s a commendable feature since the default Windows Mobile keyboards are fit for stylus use only. The first keyboard is a regular 9-key multi-tap keypad, the second one is a brand new full QWERTY and the third one is a regular Windows Mobile QWERTY optimized for use with a stylus. The new QWERTY differs from the previous one in button placement and a five-row design that gives you all four navigation arrows in the final row. In landscape mode you get the typical three-row full QWERTY with nav-keys on the right. In applications where screen auto-rotation is enabled, you also get larger landscape versions of those keyboards. The keys are big enough, the gaps between the letters takes away the chances to hit two letters in the same time and the button’s places are very well placed.

Web Browsing

With EVDO Rev. A and Wi-Fi in the mix, web browsing and data consumption shouldn’t be a problem. Where I am currently located, the EVDO Rev. A speeds are currently blazing fast like the Millennium Falcon going into warp speed and I have no problems with connecting at all. So downloading images, emails, songs and applications should be as fast right? Correct. Here is why. The Imagio comes with Opera 9.5 and Internet Explorer 6 right out of the box and they are both good browsers in their own ways. Opera as you all know, uses a compression technology unlike no other to render fully blown web-pages on mobile devices and for that reason, it is the default browser on the Imagio. The Opera browser is extensively touch-optimized and draws inspiration from the iPhone’s Safari. The browser has matured since its introduction in the Touch HD and has been updated time after time to perform with no bugs and that is a sure pleasure. The Imagio offers automatic screen rotation inside the web browser and Opera 9.5 offers a landscape QWERTY, but in the presence of the hardware one this option won’t be necessary. It also comes with a handy download manager which keeps track on the files you are currently downloading and downloaded previously. So after all of the mobile Safari comparison, do you understand why I said it’s blazing fast previously? One word, Opera.

Battery Life

It’ll do. Just kidding. Through two weeks of using the Imagio, battery life was above average. With constant emails, texting, web browsing, tweeting and listening to music, the Imagio lasted me throughout the whole day. HTC has given us a very good 1500 mAh battery to back up this Multimedia monster or however which way you plan on using it. If the Imagio didn’t have the Sense UI in this, I doubt it would last half a day since Sense does consume massive data for its programs. I connected the Imagio on a land line call and let it go until its last breathe to test out the battery life on a call. The results surpassed the specs sheet HTC has given us, 5.3 hours to the 5 hours already given. So a little extra juice is always a benefit to know that you can go a whole day or so with this device.

Conclusion

The HTC Imagio from Verizon Wireless is a fine handset. The stylish and sleek looks may have people think you are using an iPhone until they see the front and notice it isn’t. Would I purchase one for my personal usage? That answer is no. It is not a bad phone don’t get me wrong. I’m just never satisfied with just one phone for a certain amount of time. Would I purchase this phone for my wife? Yes. Something that can get her through the day and let her be able to see a few emails here and there with massive texting on a responsive screen; she’ll definitely jump on it. It’s also the kind of phone that females would consider “cute” mainly because its sleek, slim and pocketable. You can’t sell a phone now that is bulky because people want to put their devices in their skinny jeans all of a sudden and it seems that HTC and Verizon continues to go that route (with the exception of the Touch Pro2). Overall, this is a great phone. It gets the job done when it needs to and is reliable at times when needed. It earns my stamp of approval. Will you give it the same?

Breck Morrison, Vice President of Technology with Handango, just recently stopped by and brought a nice little device with him; the HTC Touch HD.

Mr. Morrison gave us some time with the device and allowed us to review it. Hit the jump for a small breakdown.

Read the full story

Design:

The Verizon Touch Diamond is a sleek and sexy phone. This being our first HTC Touch Diamond, we did not know whether this phone was going to be heavy and clunky or light and thin. However, after receiving and unboxing the unit, we were surprised to find that it is not as big and heavy as we expected. In fact, we were quite pleased with the shape and how it fit in our hands. The device only weighs a total of 4.2 ounces when the battery is in it, making it light enough to not have to worry about carrying around with you while still not making it feel cheap. We love how the back is shaped sort of like a diamond to complement the name of the phone. The phone is all black which makes it a magnet for fingerprints.

The Verizon Touch Diamond has a few buttons on it that serve to be important. On the front of the device there are five buttons. These five buttons will allow you to send and end a call, to go back, to go home, or to select something. While most of these functions can be done directly from the touch screen, it is still nice to have the option. Turning over to the back there is a 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus. On the top left there is the power/standby button; holding this button will turn the device on and off, pressing it will put into or take it out of standby mode. On the left side of the phone there are volume control buttons that also serve as a ringtone volume control. The proprietary USB jack is on the bottom of the phone that allows users to charge it, connect to the computer, or listen to music. We were disappointed that there was not a 3.5mm headphone jack since this phone has a lot of media features to it, but HTC gives you a piece to turn the proprietary USB into a headphone jack.

The screen on the Verizon HTC Touch Diamond is a 2.76-inch TFT LCD with VGA resolution. The high quality display shows when looking at the TouchFLO graphics and sample videos. The touch screen was nice and responsive to our actions without having to apply too much pressure. In terms of the display we have no complaints whatsoever.

User Interface:

The Verizon HTC Touch Diamond runs Windows Mobile 6.1 with HTC’s TouchFLO 3D interface. TouchFLO makes Windows Mobile 6.1 look great, especially with its 3D graphics and sleek interface. We were impressed how easy it was to use, compared to the standard Windows Mobile home screen. For Windows Mobile fanboys and girls, you can choose to use the standard home screen or try TouchFLO with a switch of a setting. With TouchFLO you can slide the bottom bar with your finger to get to different options like home, favorites, messaging, music, email, browser, photos and videos, apps, weather, and settings. When on these different option screens you can do an up or down slide motion to go to the next item in the menu. For example, if you have a bunch of text messages, you can swipe your finger up to get to the next text message and scroll through them that way. This also works in other menus like pictures, music, and most of the other ones. One thing we love about TouchFLO is that there is an icon on the menu bar that shows what applications are open so you can easily clear up some memory without going through all the menus. While TouchFLO is great, Windows Mobile 6.1 is still the same OS, but with an amazing skin. Because of this, Windows Mobile is still slow at times and lags a lot. There will be times when you run out of memory when trying to open the camera and there is nothing else open, but that is Windows Mobile. This is going to be as good as it gets if you want a Windows Mobile phone. The Touch Diamond has packaged as much as it can to speed up and make Windows Mobile not look slow and boring.

Applications:

If you have ever used a Windows Mobile phone before you know that the mobile Internet Explorer is not very good for browsing the web. For that reason, HTC has decided to put Opera Mobile web browser on the phone instead to make for a better web experience. Opera Mobile gives a better web experience than Internet Explorer does and allows for easy finger motions to move around the page. If users are hoping to go to a few webpages or open a link in a new tab, that is possible with this web browser and it is very easy to do. We found that pages render pretty much the same as they would on a computer. When comparing the Touch Diamond to the iPhone Safari browser, we found that this is probably the closest you are going to get to Safari without having an actual iPhone. To navigate around the webpage you just move your finger around the touch screen to get to the section you want. You can then double click a section of text or a picture to zoom in. When zooming in on text, it will format the text to fit just right, making it very easy to read. If you find Verizon’s EVDO network to be too slow, you can always use Wi-Fi if it is readily available since this device is Wi-Fi ready.

Along with the web browser, there is a YouTube application that bridges the problem of having no flash player on the browser. With this YouTube application it is possible to search through any video or see the most popular ones. The video quality when using this application is awesome and goes into full screen mode. One problem we had was that we would sometimes get an error saying there is not enough memory when trying to watch a video. The sound quality while watching videos was surprisingly good. It stayed clear even when loud but did not have much bass at all.

The Touch Diamond has a 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus. The quality of the camera is very good and better than most other similar camera phones. The autofocus makes a huge difference in the quality of the picture, putting the image in focus and making it looks crisp. After taking a picture it is very easy to send it in an email or picture message to friends with a press of a button. Overall we were very happy with the camera quality.

The HTC Touch Diamond is compatible with Verizon’s visual voicemail application that comes in handy if you get a lot of voicemail. On the Touch Diamond the program will allow you to see all the numbers who have left you voicemail and play each voicemail individually. From this application you can call the person back, add the contact into your address book, or send a text message to the person. This service is going to cost an extra $2.99 a month which is not too much if you use voicemail often.

Keyboard:

In my personal opinion, touch screen keyboard are not as easy to use as physical keyboards and the Touch Diamond is no exception. However, I do think that the keyboard is usable and laid out well. There are three different keyboard styles you can use. The default is Full QWERTY which is a full QWERTY keyboard that is pretty nicely spaced out and has an option for T9. I personally liked the fully QWERTY because it is what I am used to. However, it was difficult typing with fingers alone, making me utilize the included stylus. Secondly there is what they call a Compact QWERTY which is just two letters to a button (except m and l). This way is much easier to type with your fingers and it will guess what you are trying to say when you are typing the word. If you have ever used a BlackBerry Pearl or Storm you will recognize this as SureType. Lastly there is the Phone Keypad which pretty much explains itself. It looks just like your “dumbphone” keypad and you can use T9 or ABC with it.

Call Quality and Signal:

We made tons of calls on this device and found it very comfortable to hold on your face. When making calls, the sound on our end was pretty good and we could hear everything clearly and loud. On the other end most people said I sounded like a typical cell phone, which I guess is a good thing. Signal wise we always had at least three bars here in Tampa, FL which is to be expected in a city. We never lost signal or dropped any calls which is a nice change coming from our BlackBerry Bold. We never lost EVDO signal either which allowed us to get on the high speed internet anytime.

Battery:

The battery on the Touch Diamond really surprised us by how long it lasted. The battery is really small and compact which lead us to think it was not going to last very long. We were wrong. When we tested the battery on this device, we found that it lasted us the whole day with pretty normal use. We did a decent amount of texting, a few phones calls, some web browsing, and a few emails.

Conclusion:

All in all we really liked this phone a lot. While we are not the biggest fans of Windows Mobile, TouchFLO 3D came through and improved the software a lot. We had no trouble navigating around using our fingers and the graphics were great. The body of the device is really small and sleek making it a very cool looking device. A lot of Windows Mobile phones have problems with battery life, but this phone is an exception with great battery life that will last you throughout the day. Who would we recommend this phone to? Well if you are looking for a small device that has a lot of capabilities to get in touch with the internet, then this is a phone for you.

Unboxing: